Forum Discussion

mr__ed's avatar
mr__ed
Explorer
Oct 30, 2016

picasaweb and Google photos

I had many photos stored on the Picasa website for years. Well, Google has eliminated that site and replaced it with Google photos. That's OK with me. The problem is I can't find all those old Picasa photos. I searched and searched Google photos but can't find where the Picasa photos have gone. My understanding is that they can still be accessed on Google, but it beats me how to do it. Anyone have a similar experience? If so, what was the outcome? Fortunately, I have those photos backed up on CD's. I just have to locate them. Thanks.
  • Well, I found my backup CD's and am now copying the photos to Google Photos. I'm glad I had the presence of mind not to fully trust the cloud, but backed everything up to other media.
  • When I open archived photos in Google Photos only 6 show up. There must have been over 100 on Picasaweb. I'm not going to worry too much about it. I'll have to locate those backup CD's that I have somewhere and upload them to Google. I do appreciate all your efforts to help.
  • all of my photoe were transistion to Google Photos and my drive
  • It took almost six months for Google to move my Picasa photo albums. At first they only moved photos but they didn't move the captions along with them.

    In April I decided to buy space on Smugmug... I went ahead and opened a SmugMug account. The transfer of Picasa Web Albums was smooth and seamless using an extension called Smugglr in Firefox. All my captions seem to be there. Customization is minimal at the $5 a month or $40 a yr. basic level - For $5 I figured I could play and work with it.
  • Probably the most important is to be sure and log in with the same acount that you used for Picasa. That may be your problem.
  • When I log into the e-mail account that I used to use for Picasa Web Albums and then go to Photos in the options grid upper right, those albums are in the Albums section of Google Photos. They don't have a Picasa tag, just look like my newer Google Photos albums.

    I don't like GP because I use these albums to share and some of my shar-ees have had trouble seeing the photos no matter what kind of link I send them. Also, how to access the captions on the photos is not easily obvious.
  • Once you've logged into your Google account try a search for "album archive." You have to use the same Google account that you used to create the Picasa web albums, sometimes tricky, because we sometimes have more Google accounts than we realize (I have at least three because a couple of e-mail providers I don't really use migrated their services to GMail and created accounts in my name).

    Picasa Web Albums had been going to Google+ Photos (Googles effort to be another Facebook) but I think you would be better off linking your albums to Google Photos, which is more of a image management tool, with online editing. You will lose your Picasa tags and edits, as Picasa maintained this information separate from the image files, and Photos accesses only the image files.

    I've not gone through this migration myself. When I started experimenting with Picasa as a local tool, Google Photos had already been set up and was more useful to me, and it was clear that Web Albums were on their way out, as this was already being discussed in Picasa forums in early 2013.

    What browser you are using could be a factor. I use Google Photos only with Chrome, and my Chrome default is logging into Googles welcome page, so Photos shows up as one of the apps under the apps icon in the upper right corner of my welcome page. On my phone and tablet, Google Photos has a dedicated app.
  • A quick search turned up this link: https://support.google.com/picasa/answer/156342?hl=en

    Picasa & Picasa Web Albums are no longer supported. Learn more

    What's happening to Picasa?

    Picasa is now retired. (If you speak English, you can read the blog post here

    Picasa Web Albums
    If you have photos or videos in a Picasa Web Album today, the easiest way to still access, modify and share most of that content is to log in to Google Photos, and all your photos and videos will already be there. Using Google Photos, you can continue to upload and organize your memories, as well as enjoy other great benefits like better ways to search and share your images.

    - - - - -

    I am guessing you already saw that. Somewhere in that mess I saw you need to have your user number not your user name AND you have to get through:
    One account. All of Google.
    Sign in with your Google Account
  • Also, if you will google "picasa web albums" there are a lot of links to help.
  • I just type in "picasawebalbums", and it goes to a Google archive that contains all my albums and pictures. There are several options, including download back to your own computers. Also, there are some links that explain all about it and how to use it.

About RV Must Haves

Have a product you cannot live without? Share it with the community!8,793 PostsLatest Activity: Aug 22, 2023